Guest Post: You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet - Part One

“Human history seems logical in afterthought but a mystery in forethought. Writers of history have a way of describing interwar societies as coursing from postwar to prewar as though people alive at the time knew when that transition occurred.” – Strauss & Howe- The Fourth Turning

Watching pompous politicians, egotistical economists, arrogant investment geniuses, clueless media pundits, and self- proclaimed experts on the Great Depression predict an economic recovery and a return to normalcy would be amusing if it wasn’t so pathetic. Their lack of historical perspective does a huge disservice to the American people, as their failure to grasp the cyclical nature of history results in a broad misunderstanding of the Crisis the country is facing. The ruling class and opinion leaders are dominated by linear thinkers that believe the world progresses in a straight line. Despite all evidence of history clearly moving through cycles that repeat every eighty to one hundred years (a long human life), the present generations are always surprised by these turnings in history. I can guarantee you this country will not truly experience an economic recovery or progress for another fifteen to twenty years. If you think the last four years have been bad, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

Hope is not an option. There is too much debt, too little cash-flow, too many promises, too many lies, too little common sense, too much mass delusion, too much corruption, too little trust, too much hate, too many weapons in the hands of too many crazies, and too few visionary leaders to not create an epic worldwide implosion. Too bad. We’ve experienced horrific Crisis periods three times in the last 250 years and winter has arrived again exactly as forecasted by Strauss & Howe in 1997. The linear thinkers will continue to predict a recovery that never arrives. We have awful trials and tribulations, dreadful sacrifices of blood and treasure, and grim choices awaiting our country over the next fifteen years. Linear thinkers will scoff at such a statement as they irrationally view the world as a never ending forward progression towards a glorious future. History proves them wrong. We stand here in the year 2012 with no good options, only less worse options. Decades of foolishness, debt accumulation, and a materialistic feeding frenzy of delusion have left the world broke and out of options. And still our leaders accelerate the debt accumulation, while encouraging the masses to carry-on as if nothing has changed since 2008. Sadly, millions of lemmings want to believe they will not drown in the sea of un-payable commitments. Truth is a scarce resource on the planet today.

“Sometimes people don’t want to hear the truth because they don’t want their illusions destroyed.” – Friedrich Nietzsche

Entire populations taking comfort in their illusions transcends centuries. This is because all humans are driven by their emotions and react to events and danger in a predictable manner depending on their stage of life. Strauss & Howe in their 1997 opus – The Fourth Turning – utilized decades of studying generational dynamics to anticipate when our next Crisis would arrive and what core elements would precipitate it:

“The next Fourth Turning is due to begin shortly after the new millennium, midway through the Oh-Oh decade. Around the year 2005, a sudden spark will catalyze a Crisis mood. Remnants of the old social order will disintegrate. Political and economic trust will implode. Real hardship will beset the land, with severe distress that could involve questions of class, race, nation and empire. The very survival of the nation will feel at stake. Sometime before the year 2025, America will pass through a great gate in history, commensurate with the American Revolution, Civil War, and twin emergencies of the Great Depression and World War II.” – Strauss & Howe- The Fourth Turning

The American people are mentally ensnared by their decades of indoctrination from propagandists in government and on Wall Street, spoon fed to them by the corporate mainstream media. Many are afflicted with the diseases of normalcy bias and cognitive dissonance. Normalcy bias refers to a mental state people enter when facing a disaster. It causes people to underestimate both the possibility of a disaster occurring and its possible effects. The American people are mentally incapable of accepting the facts of our impending economic collapse. They somehow are able to convince themselves these facts as normal:

We’ve increased our national debt by $5.6 trillion in the last three and a half years. It took from 1789 until 2000, two hundred and eleven years, to accumulate the first $5.6 trillion of debt.

Our average annual deficit from 2000 through 2008 was $190 billion. Our average annual deficits since 2008 have been $1.3 trillion. Our deficits never exceeded 4% of GDP prior to 2008, but now they exceed 9%.

The national debt will reach $20 trillion by 2015 and if interest rates normalized to the same level they were in 2007 (5%), annual interest expense would be $1 trillion, or 45% of current tax revenue.

There are 242 million working age Americans and 100 million of them are not working. But don’t concern yourself. The Federal government reports that only 13 million of these people are actually unemployed. The other 87 million are just kicking back and living off their accumulated riches.

The economic recovery has been so great that the 7.5 million people added to the Food Stamp rolls since the recession officially ended in December 2009 isn’t really an indication of severe stress among the 99%. Only 46.5 million Americans (15% of the population) need food stamps to survive.

The unfunded liabilities of Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security exceed $100 trillion and cannot possibly be honored, leaving future generations to fend for themselves.

Our leaders have fought two undeclared wars of choice since 2001 that have resulted in 6,400 unnecessary soldier deaths, 47,500 badly wounded, $1.3 trillion of borrowed treasure, with unfunded liabilities of at least $2 trillion more, and we are itching for more of the same with our coming war with Iran. A bankrupt empire still trying to police the world is the ultimate act of hubris.

After causing a worldwide financial collapse in 2008 with their extreme risk taking, tangibly fraudulent mortgage schemes, and reckless pillaging of their clients and the American people, Wall Street used their complete systematic capture of our political and economic system to shift $8 trillion of toxic debt from their books onto the backs of American taxpayers. They have since become even more flagrant in their disregard for human decency by using the hundreds of billions in free money funneled to them by Ben Bernanke to take even bigger risks and pay themselves grander bonuses. Total unregulated derivatives (real WMD) outstanding now exceed $700 trillion.

Since 2001 the Federal government has used fear to assume unprecedented and unconstitutional powers over the citizens of this country. They can now use surveillance to monitor your phones calls, emails, and websites visited, without warrants. You can be imprisoned without charges for as long as the government decides you are a threat. TSA agents molest little old ladies and children trying to fly on airplanes. The President can take over the entire economy through presidential decree. Predator spy drones can eliminate suspected terrorists whenever a general gives the command. An order for 30,000 spy drones to be flying over U.S. cities should make you feel safe. The $2 billion NSA Utah Data Gathering Center (code name Stellar Wind) will be able to intercept and store every electronic signal on the planet by 2013. Sacrificing liberty for perceived safety and security isn’t working out too well for the American people.

Anyone with an ounce of critical thinking skill would conclude our current situation is far from normal. We’ve become a cognitive dissonant nation. We convince ourselves the best way to solve a debt problem is to create more debt. We believe we are made safer by attacking foreign countries. We have convinced ourselves it makes sense for Too Big to Fail Wall Street banks that create systematic financial risk to get even bigger, after their fraudulent frenzy of greed virtually crashed our economic system. We actually believe the two party political system offers us a choice, when both parties genuflect to Wall Street, gratify corporate special interests, fight never ending wars, and spend money they don’t have. We choose to believe government statistics that claim inflation is running at 3%, when our everyday reality attests it to be 10%. We trust the Federal Reserve to maintain price stability even though their policies have resulted in a 97% depreciation in the U.S. dollar since 1913. We believe the future will be bright, even though 60% of workers have less than $25,000 in total savings.

In the ultimate example of cognitive dissonance the majority of Americans scorned and ridiculed the young people being beaten, maced and arrested for protesting the rampant criminality of the Wall Street 1%ers while supporting a billionaire banker bailout, 0% interest rates that punish senior citizens and savers while encouraging further debt accumulation, and not be outraged that not one criminal banker has gone to jail. They somehow are able to observe the data in the table below and still believe that America offers equal opportunity to everyone.

Americans have thus far been unable to deal with the reality of our desperate circumstances. They remind me of people who see the ocean recede from the shoreline and curiously venture out where the sea had flowed to pick up trinkets and pretty shells with no sense of what is truly happening. The deadly 20 foot high tsunami headed their way will be a complete shock when they are swept away in a torrent of bad debt and worthless currencies. We are about to enter phase two of this Fourth Turning Crisis still in denial and terribly unprepared for the frightful trials that await our nation. It’s not as if it hasn’t happened before, just like clockwork. William Strauss and Neil Howe were able to document turnings in Anglo-American history dating back to the 15th century. The life cycles of human beings and the moods of generations at different stages of their lives are consistent across time, resulting in predictable responses to events during a particular time frame. Fourth Turnings are a time of Crisis, danger and vulnerability. The Crisis periods in modern history are as follows:

War of the Roses (1459 – 1487), Late Medieval Saeculum

Armada Crisis (1569 – 1594), Reformation Saeculum

Glorious Revolution (1675 – 1704), New World Saeculum

American Revolution (1773 – 1794), Revolutionary Saeculum

Civil War (1860 – 1865), Civil War Saeculum

Great Depression & World War II (1929 – 1946), Great Power Saeculum

Millenial Crisis (2008 – ????), Millenial Saeculum

Using a seasonal analogy, the Crisis is the wintry bitter dark era, where deadly blizzards rage and the citizens are pushed to the brink. In retrospect the three previous American Crisis periods seem easy to predict, but one year prior to their onset NO ONE could have predicted the epic sacrifices and horrific casualties of war to follow. In 1772 there were few people expecting America to declare independence and fight an eight year war for independence. In 1859 virtually no one expected the election of Abraham Lincoln as president and an ensuing war that would kill 700,000 American men. In 1928 no one imagined the stock market losing 89% of its value, an eleven year depression, and a world war resulting in over 60 million deaths. History is only logical in afterthought. The mystery of forethought is where we find ourselves today.

In a recent article, Neil Howe provided insight into why he believes the current Fourth Turning began in 2008, sixty-two years since the end of the Depression/WWII Crisis, which was sixty-four years after the Civil War Crisis, which was sixty-six years after the American Revolution Crisis:

“I believe the catalyst occurred in 2008. The year 2008 marked the onset of the most serious U.S. economic crisis since the Great Depression. It also marked the election of Barack Obama, which could yet turn out to be a pivotal realignment date in U.S. political history. In fact, if I had to give the catalyst a month, I would say September of 2008. The global Dow was in free fall. Banks were failing. Money markets froze shut. Business owners held their breath.” – Neil Howe – Dating the Fourth Turning

Howe uses the term catalyst to describe the trigger or event that initiates the Crisis. Strauss and Howe determined that a Crisis progresses through four stages during its life cycle, as described below:

A Crisis era begins with a catalyst – a startling event (or sequence of events) that produces a sudden shift in mood.

Once catalyzed, a society achieves a regeneracy – a new counter-entropy that reunifies and reenergizes civic life.

The regenerated society propels toward a climax – a crucial moment that confirms the death of the old order and birth of the new.

The climax culminates in a resolution – a triumphant or tragic conclusion that separates the winners from losers, resolves the big public questions, and establishes the new order.

We have countless valleys to cross and mountains to ascend before reaching our ultimate destination. There are no guarantees the outcomes will be positive or that the nation as we know it will even exist. It is certain that in twenty years the social order of this country will not resemble what exists today. The transformation could be positive or negative, depending upon whether we make the right choices during this Crisis.

“The nation could be ruined, its democracy destroyed, and millions of people scattered or killed. Or America could enter a new golden age, triumphantly applying shared values to improve the human condition. The rhythms of history do not reveal the outcome of the coming Crisis; all they suggest is the timing and dimension.”– Strauss & Howe- The Fourth Turning

Precisely. But this is why we need EXPERTS to allocate resources, rather than mere amateurs. The mass delusion of the ignorant investing public frequently leads to hysterical investment decisions such as equity sell-offs and speculative manias in commodities. If prices were set by objective mathematical models, there would be less volatility and more reasonable action.

Also, the best way to avoid corruption is to delegate important duties to politicians rather than leave them with the indifferent and uninterested public who have more important things to do, like watch monster truck racing or play bingo. For example, most people agree that abolishing the welfare state would be incredibly ridiculous, because the public cannot be trusted to help the poor. Since we know that politicians are more trustworthy than average people, we know that we can safely delegate this responsibility to the government.

"Watching pompous politicians, egotistical economists, arrogant investment geniuses, clueless media pundits, and self- proclaimed experts on the Great Depression predict an economic recovery and a return to normalcy would be amusing if it wasn’t so pathetic."

Translation. Everyone else is wrong, so listen to me because my prediction of the future is correct!

That did it for me. While I tend to agree with much of what they say, something as simple as China lifting the peg to the dollar could have profound impact on the global trade imbalances and reverse the never ending debt issuance. It certainly won't fix where we are now, but perhaps the future won't be as dire as is described in this piece.

You wish dumbass Americans would actually work in factories instead of being paid welfare and jump off of their housing units instead of keep voting for the elites with their delusion that they are special too.

Anyway... are these the same "experts" that have been repeatedly wrong? Or, are you thinking of some other, yet to be determined (mystery), experts?

Any chance that any experts realize that this is a finite planet? I suspect that they'll all be of the kind that is only looking to serve power, power which ONLY exists through the false notion of infinite resources (otherwise such power would have to themselves work [and, given that humans have to have "leaders," well... some just cannot get dirt under their fingernails- false gods]).

"nature thrives on diversity". Horseshit. quit puking PC mantras, and let's review such diverse things as bi-lateral symmetry, Wombats and woodchucks, or iron based blood. Form follows function and there are typically very, very few ways to do something right.

Totally agree with the dirty fingernails thing though. Adaptability is the key. When the great purge comes, the skilled, clever and lucky will prevail.

pretty sure the diversity was between species & between groups of a species (strategies, immunities, etc.) ... citing symmetry is helpful to a small degree but even then it is an imperfect symmetry & typically only left-right.

So true, why I am old enough to remember what things were like before George HW Bush instituted his compassionate conservatism by federally mandating handicapped parking spaces near the entrances of public buildings. Remember the horror of old ladies and pregnant women being beaten senseless in parking lots all over the country? It was really winnner take all back then, until our magnanimous leaders instructed us on how to be compassionate.

Million Dollar Bonus can not be serious it has to be sarcasm. A person can not be that stupid. However we all know that some are that stupid. Your posts are my favorite because you are either the most sarcastic person on ZH or the stupidest. The more I read your posts the more I try and guess what occupation would produce such a stupid person.

How the fuck do you end up plus 32 and minus 47? Are there really another 32 people in the world as stupid as you. Not possible. Though its more believable than there being 32 people in the world as sarcastic as you.

Did you create 32 acccounts so you could have at least 32 people agree with your thoughts?

Foxconn pays $1.25/hr and US/EU wages will eventually drop to compete when the debt bubble can no longer finance the ones living off the system. Who can blame them? It free and fun to live w/o working. Treasury payments for entitlments/student aid etc now exceeds its total income tax collections. Less than half of workers pay any Fed. income tax. But equities will continue to go higher until the central bankers can't increase liquidity w/o impacting inflation and/or interest rates. Radiation problems in Japan w reactor #2 may be even a bigger problem (www.enenews.com)

Foxconn and the like won't exist when the bottom falls out. Really, who the fuck is going to be able to buy all this shit if they're making only $1.25/hr? FOOD is going to become VERY expensive, there won't be "disposable" income for all those jobs that you THINK are "work." And keep in mind that all of this fantasy world of corporate products ONLY works because of GROWTH; and, as is now patently clear, growth is dead.

Indeed. With American's making Chinese and Mexican wages, food, fuel and housing will be hard to come by on a buck an hour. Who in God's name is going to be lining up a day ahead of time for a new I-Phone and buying Apps for it?? "Angry Birds in Space"? Or a loaf of bread for your kids"? What will the $1.00 an hour wage earner choose for his family?

Race to the bottom? Looks good to the elites until bottom is reached and we have billions of $1.00 an hour wage earners looking for revenge!

SocSec/Medicare were supposed to be "pay as you go" programs, so payroll taxes are not considered part of the government's general revenue. But they've been using payroll taxes as part of general revenue for a very long time. The "SocSec surplus" was never a surplus--it was just money that was used to decrease the budget deficit.

And the "budget deficit" is a very different beast than the "annual deficit" because there are lots of kinds of government spending that don't get added to the budget--they get paid for with "supplemental spending" bills. This is why the budget deficit during the Iraq war was so (relatively) low--none of the costs of prosecuting that war were "on-budget."

So Quinn talks about "annual deficit," and in that regard, he's right (with the $196B figure) because all the payroll-taxes surplus was folded into general revenue.

Why do we look toward the longest and most notorious economic contractions in history for advice, instead of looking to the most brief and creatively destructive ones? Why endlessly examine failed policies through the course of the Great Depression instead of examining the mercifully short depression in 1920-21? Why emulate the worst action instead of seeking the best outcome?

because history shows us that in this country, severe economic downturns accompanied both by small government and government inaction are brief whereas severe economic downturns accompanied by big government and active intervention by government drag on and on.

Scary to think, however, that the 1920-1921 crack-up built up enough pressure to result in the 1929 crack-up. Yeah, the "recovery" out of the 1929 crack-up was fucked up, but one has to wonder whether even the handling of the 1920-1921 can "correct" (in the sense that there's really any "normal") what has become so ingrained post that era.

Today's there's WAY more humans struggling for less resources. "Re-balancing" is going to be much different in this day and age...

do you have a #ucking idea what INTRA GOVERMENT HOLDINGS ARE?
ITS MONEY FROM SS FUNDS, taken, counted as normal revenues and spent..
what is why during Clinton 2d term there were so called suplus years

mr 'what is his name' did not say annual increase in public debt, he said 'annual deficit' , so WHATS WHY HE MADE A FACTUAL FRAUD to serve his agenda..

you said "Our average annual deficits ", YOU DIDNT SAY ANNUAL INCREASE IN PUBLIC DEBT.. so either you dont have a clue or commited factual fraud..
, cause you only used figures for public debt deficit from 2000-2008 yy
(2008 y excling BTW, somehow)

if you dont have idea what INTRA GOVERMENT HOLDINGS ARE and why its debt too, well you waste ZH readers time ..

there are too much idiots here who dont have a clue about facts and macroeconomics

Is it simply a coincidence that the deficit began to climb again once Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid had their chance to shape the Federal budget? They took power in 2007 and their first budget would have been the 2008 budget. Bush went along with them, ergo it's Bush's fault. (This time I really mean it, this isn't just sarcasm. He could have vetoed the excessive spending.)

Total fed debt prior to 1980 -from Geo Washington to Jimmy Carter - less than 1 trillion
After Reagans 8 years - 3 trillion 200% increase in 8 years
Bush 1 - up to 5 trillion - 60% increase in 4 years
Clinton from 5 trill up to 6 trill in 8 years - 16% increase over 8 years
Shrub bush 6 trillion to 11 trillion -80% increase over 8 years - and that doesn't include the bailouts as the fiscal year starts on Oct 1 - so most of the bailouts go on the Oilybombers watch.
Obummer - 11 up to 15+ trillion in 3 years....

Let's admit it the disaster started with Nixon and his gold standard shinangins and kissenger opening up china - those devil commie bastards.

"Let's admit it the disaster started with Nixon and his gold standard shinangins"

Close!

It "started" when US oil production peaked and the US went from a net energy exporter to a net energy importer. It's physical resources that matter the most; and of these, energy is BIG (energy IS power!).

All civilizations start a downward spiral when their natural resource based becomes insufficient to maintain growth: and given that perpetual growth on a finite planet isn't possible, ALL civilizations WILL collapse- all the finger-pointing (usually politically driven [fucking Party Pussies]) is meaningless, it's powerless in the face of the prevailing paradigm of grow, grow, grow...

The EPA is one of the largest dangers to society due to the likelihood of them declaring smoke from burning fiat to be a pollutant. People need to wake up and realize what this means. Paper dollars' one real utility and practical value, to be able to be burned for warmth, is threatened by this government agency! Save USD BTUs!

Its seamless bureacratic transition from wonkdom to a religious cult (evolving in positive self-serving steps of increasing power and wlth) seems to track the worst aspects of human nature pretty well. What did we suppose might happen when one creates the greatest engine of private property rights' destruction ever devised? It is a "natural" progression if history is any guide

Without the EPA the NAT GAS PIMPS like Pickens, Cramer, et al,(YOU TOO?) would have already lobbied the Gov to create an artificial market for nat gas, mandating all Fed trucks use it, and got subsidies to build LNG terminals, then they can say we CAN'T STOP FRACKING! "We'll lose jobs" ! Fracking needs to be stopped in it's tracks until we find out about the leakage of chemicals/methane into the water table and earthquakes, you sound like one who doesn't give a shit about our WATER. Right?

I think you missed the satirical element of my comment. But actually the EPA does more to enable most polluters or those with ulterior political motives than stop them. EPA is pay to play like anything else. They merely put their stamp of approval on pollution that companies pay for permission to emit.

True environmental justice would be a function of liability with actual equivalent damages according to the emissions.

Right, sure, do understand the legal concept of standing? If you cannot prove an economic burden, you do not have standing. You cannot successfully sue all car drivers for your child's asthma. If you think the court's should resolve all environmental liability, you would have to remove the personhood of corporations and vastly increase funding for the courts.

It's much cheaper to regulate than to allow pollution and try to clean it up through moneys received through judgements. The reason for the EPA is that the judicial system is ill equiped to deal with the issues.

The is the same failure as Libertarianism. You transfer the protection of the commons from the Legislative branch to the Judicial, an after-the-fact attempt at resulution which is many times more expensive than prevention.

Actually there are various class-action approaches that would work quite well. And I'd much rather funding go toward having an operational justice system than to the crony-flush EPA. Although much of that funding can and should be obtained through the participants, which cuts down on frivolous lawsuits as well.

The expensive resolution need only happen once to demonstrate the true cost of polluting. Conversely, with the legislative/bureacracy solution, the EPA merely needs to be bought off and the pollution can continue perpetually.

You are allowing your mind to only operate within the boundaries of the current paradigm. Things need not be the way they are, and the boogeymen you cite to protect the status quo are bogus.

ok donsluck, i have a serious question. do you think, when drafting regulations, that the epa applies a cost / benefit analysis balancing the good done for society by the regulations against the harm done to society by the regulations?

The Fourth Turning is an in-depth historic analysis in comparison with this article. Everything is 'explained' nothing is ambiguous. These are popular, I must say and that is all that really counts in today's hyper-consumptive society.

Whoever wishes to foresee the future must consult the past; for human events ever resemble those of preceding times. This arises from the fact that they are produced by men who ever have been, and ever shall be, animated by the same passions, and thus they necessarily have the same results.--Machiavelli

Interesting. If you are thinking only of human behavior, then you have a point. But the previous commenter seems to be talking about the expression of human "nature," which is not environmentally determined. Unless you are as stupid as Marx, who decreed that all human activity was imposed upon them by their economic "class" environment. He denied that humans possessed a durable and persistent human nature, and that we could all be re-programmed to serve the state in perfect contentment. This enterprise has been unsuccessful, unless degrading and then liquidating the entire human race under the cruelest conditions was what they were aiming at.

""Americans have thus far been unable to deal with the reality of our desperate circumstances. They remind me of people who see the ocean recede from the shoreline and curiously venture out where the sea had flowed to pick up trinkets and pretty shells with no sense of what is truly happening.

Americans have thus far been unable to deal with the reality of our desperate circumstances. They remind me of people who see the ocean recede from the shoreline and curiously venture out where the sea had flowed to pick up trinkets and pretty shells with no sense of what is truly happening.""

There may be a larger than desired portion of the US citizens who "dont get it", say over 50%. However, ZH type outlets of other versions of information and events are doing well. As an expanding readership shows, it is not over yet.

The link led me to a graph showing traffic due to search analytics. There was another tab, Traffic, with a sub-tab called Reach. That indicated that traffic seemed to be fairly constant, except for a fall in late January that coincided with the warm weather that sent ZH readers to the parks. Call it an unseasonal adjustment.

It was on a strong and steady increase -- catching up to and passing the much longer established infowars.com -- right up until early December. Then it started on a downward track, falling by 13% since early December and falling behind infowars again.

I have noticed this trend and been watching it on Alexa because I became pissed off with the 'new Tylers' approach in early December and wondered whether others would also feel the same way. It seems now that many did/do.

However, I read between the lines on ZH rather than absorbing the propaganda, so I have stayed with it and contribute regularly because this is still the only board where I can glean intelligent commentary -- both from the Tylers and from a number of remaining commenters (including one or two newer ones).

Interesting. Can you elaborate on the change in the 'editorial approach'? It would seem that the site loses 'reach' as the market lurches from each Fed-endorsed bubble phase to bubble phase. In other words people are not interested in the contrarian tone when there is easy money to be had by just buying and holding one's nose.

IMO. A bearish website will do well in a bearish market. The Dow broke through the 200day approximately in Dec. 2011. There are plenty of perma-bears that would like to make some cash in this BS market before the whole thing crashes, and do not need ZH making them second guess the free ride that is currently going on, which leads to avoiding ZH artilces.

The trend I see over time is the lack of people in the business posting here. There used to be posts here that were incredibly insightful full of analysis. Now we are seeing posts like: "first", "end of the dollar" type posts. When readers had a question, someone in the industry could answer it quite eloquently, now it appears none are interested in questioning the data in these threads, or answering them for that matter.

While ZH is still fairly informative, I miss the input of some posters long gone that really had substance in the comments section.

"I can guarantee you this country will not truly experience an economic recovery or progress for another fifteen to twenty years."

What does "economic recovery" mean? Recover to what? Further, we CAN_NOT have perpetual growth on a finite planet. The entire "economic" construct WILL end, nothing is written in physics stating otherwise.

Entropy increases unless an act by a directing agency reverses it. Human activity can be used to decrease - however locally - entropy. The only proposed exception to this is the incredible complexity and information density in DNA, which - according to some - miraculously increased (information, not entropy) based on an exceptional string of random events. (For more information, grab a copy of the book "Genetic Entropy & the Mystery of the Genome" by Dr. John Sanford.)

Oh brother, here we go again. If you look at any organism (or even several living organisms), it would appear that the information in DNA is increasing while essentially beating entropy (i.e. entropy decreases). But remember, this is at the expense of energy and the DNA of those other organisms that go fucking extinct. So the energy changes form (becomes less useful) and the information in those other extinct organisms is lost forever.

The total entropy of the universe is increasing (2nd law) while the total energy remains constant (first law). So not only will humanity not win, it won't even be able to break even. Now go be productive and enjoy life, it is what it is.

"But remember, this is at the expense of energy and the DNA of those other organisms that go fucking extinct. So the energy changes form (becomes less useful) and the information in those other extinct organisms is lost forever."

---

Your paradigm would seem to indicate that we should be getting fewer and fewer species over the years as oranisms become extinct and their DNA is lost forever. Yet if life has been on our planet for billions of years, why do we still have so much diversity? If our planet indeed had so much diversity and higher quality DNA billions of years ago, where did that incomprehensible level of information in the DNA come from? Did the Big Bang spawn such unbelievably complex and beautiful things that after many billions of years of entropy we still have such astounding remnants?

When you can plot the diversity over the last 400 million years acurrately, then we can begin to answer that question. Beside, how do you measure diversity? Organisms have gotten more complex but that does not in and of itself mean things have gotten more diverse. Two different things all together. Moreover, who are you to decide precisely what is "high quality" DNA. The fact remains that in the relatively very short period of time that we have been keeping track, we have exchanged the DNA of numerous species for more human DNA. I'd argue that, if anything, we have been increasing the DNA of the shit organism and not the quality organisms, but I will let your next response be the judge of that.

We have to many gamers ( politicians, accountants, cheats....) and not enough ( creators, workers... ). People always try to game systems to gain much without working; including me when the game is easy and obvious. Those of us who are willing to work do; particularly when it pays. Many of the hard core gamers will work their ass off trying to find an easy way out even if work pays better.

Yeah, yeah, we get it, everything's hopeless. Shit is fucked up and bullshit. That book from 15 years ago is a really great source of insight into the fucked-upness and the bullshitness, but you're pretty seriously lacking in any kind of vision for steps to take. Just maybe there have been other literary works worth investigating.

Check out a more recent book and see if maybe you could come up with a single constructive suggestion. For sure continuing to focus on an old snapshot isn't going to help things--if you can suggest something that motivates people, you just might be able to help change the course we're on that you keep moaning about.

If this is the Titanic, you're a guy who keeps griping about the errors that led to hitting an iceberg a few hours ago. What good can you possibly accomplish by looking backwards?

Blunderdog, the country, its leaders, most of the world, are in DENIAL. First step is to wake up. Just to see the cyclical versus linear idea constitutes an enormous shift. Without wake up we have no capacity to face and deal with the future.

Poster says authors describe; they don't prescribe. Instead of banging on your high chair, why don't you take steps to diminish the collective cognitive dissonance? Help others wake up, to discard the delusional paradigm.

Movie studios should worry less about file sharing and more about making decent movies. The Hunger Games put up what numbers the opening weekend? $150M+? Ghost Rider did how much? If you make a good movie people will go see it, when they dish out crap it no longer flies like it did in the 90s before people could get instantenous reviews like on Rottentomatoes.

His basis is mostly facile generalizations, intellectually dishonest, and riddled with pungent strands of his sheepish self-loathing. This article is simply another tiresome exercise, crypto-ideology devoid of actual, nightmarish, pivotal facts.

YOU DON'T KNOW NOTHING YET

Where is his analysis of the over televised bloody coup which happened on 9/11/2001?

There is a definite scaly, almost reptilian undercurrent to the entire article because of his lack of understanding of Nazi ameriKlan politics, the true facts, the many undercurrents, the Fascist's WAR AND TERROR: the ramifications of 9/11.

Maybe Quinn should try Tarot cards next time...after all, out of the whole pack, there are bound to be a few cards that will accurately correspond to his limited, blinkered vision of reality.

The kind of Junk History found in The 4th Turning contributes nothing to the advancement of mankind's journey. Many ramifications are listed, and a few of them right, no matter what. Many people have made wild guesses...almost all of them have come out wrong. It is a kooky, neurotic theory of a future that strongly rings of simplistic economic cycle predictions by discredited futurist wonks. It only serves to feed those of simplistic and lazy minds, and to make overdrawn conclusions. By Quinn endlessly using this shallow book he leans hard to the far right, toward deterministic Fascism on the political spectrum.

Strauss and Howe make careless and bold statements and present their far fetched theory as fact. Very intriguing on the surface, but frankly irritating in the lack of solid scientific process when examined.

It is "prophesy"… predictions that are sufficiently vague and only satisfy simpletons.

Yet, SmokeyQuinn once again turns to this kind of junk thinking with his simplistic praise of the "answers" from ignorant religious zealots, pawns of bought politicians… overall it is a useless tirade.

If our species is to survive, and enlightened culture to progress, we must reject such simplistic models. Thinking minds must do the hard work necessary to discover rational solutions to our most perplexing problems by facing 9/11 TRUTH squarely.

SmokeyQuinn does not contribute to this endeavor.

His time would be better spent in serious research to dispel his ignorance, his own cognotive dissonance, toward a much deeper understanding of the scientific basis of 9/11 TRUTH.

Anyone with a brain knows both world trade center incidents were false flags, but after 9/11 the country has to "stay the course".

This is the definitive ideological struggle of the 21st century bro, are you patriotic enough to perpetuate lies and praise war criminals? This is the calling of our generation. Time to stand up and lie like grownups. If we don't, America is finished.

What about the work of Kondratieff, Elliott, and Minsky. Long wave supercycles exist, and no amount of vitriol can make them disappear. Your argument is weakened by the slurs and attacks. Attack the person is tired Aristotelian gambit. Yes, 2001 is huge, but don't get hysterical about how these cycles are timed. Hell, I can make a Kondratieff case for 1930-2000 as complete cycle. You may be throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Or you may just be a troll, in which case you will kindly fuck off and die.

Let's assume the author of this piece is correct. Instead of dissecting the current data, and bitching about how we got the fuck here why don't we figure out how to make it to the other side? Hmmm? Make sure you live through the tsunami and rebuild your huts.

The collapse could take years, could be next month. All this bullshitting is a waste of energy.

Personally, I am going to buy more things to see me and my family through this.

Unfortunately, a psychologically primitive state of denial remains the norm . . . though, in fairness, it might be more properly termed a mass illusion actively cultivated by the corporate mass media apparatus.